Eco-electricity and heat from biomass

 Safety technology for a groundbreaking biomass power station

A biomass power station generates electric power by burning biomass like wood chips, bark and untreated wood. This is based on a high-tech process which has been modified in Oberwart, Austria. Here, the biomass is gasified under high temperatures in order to generate energy. Safety technology from Pilz makes sure that everything happens according to plan.

The technology behind wood gasification is not fundamentally new, as it has in fact already been known for several decades. Particularly in times of war or other crisis, during which there was often a shortage of fuel, vehicles were operated with wood gas engines. Of course, issues like "alternative production of energy" and "energy efficiency" were of no concern then. In the biomass power station in Oberwart, state-of-the-art wood gasification technology is used to achieve the maximum possible efficiency.
Today, the wood gas produced in the power station passes through a highly sophisticated purification process, and only then is it used to run two large gas engines. The electricity generated in this way is fed into the public grid. As a by-product of the system, large quantities of heat are also generated.

Special methods deliver high performance
Every year the biomass power station in Oberwart generates 16 GWh of eco-electricity and 21 Wh of heat. This is enough to supply around 4,300 households with electricity and around 1,600 households with heat.
The special technique used in the biomass power station is based on dual fluidized bed gasification technology. Here, the combustion zone and gasification zone are kept separate. Water vapor is used as the gasification agent. In this way, a product gas is generated in the gasification zone which is low in tar and virtually free of nitrogen. It also has a higher calorific value than the product gas obtained with other gasification methods.
With the technology applied here, the biomass power station in Oberwart is at the cutting edge in terms of efficient use of biomass for the production of eco-electricity and heat.

Flexible safety concept
In terms of safety, Ortner GmbH in Innsbruck/Tyrol who constructed the plant used the programmable PSS 3000 control system from Pilz for the first time. As a freely programmable system which is suitable for modular expansion, PSS 3000 can be flexibly adapted to the specific requirements of the plant. Looking at the required functionality, the number of inputs and outputs which needed to be integrated and the usability of the system, it became clear that this control system was the ideal solution for the safety requirements which needed to be implemented. It records and processes all safety-related messages and signals in the system, including the signals from the emergency stop, temperature and pressure sensors, lance monitoring and flame monitor systems. Networking of the signals into a standard PLC was implemented via the inputs and outputs.